News of the Week (November 12th, 2017)

Gun Rights

Self-help, Texas style
The Guardian recounts the story of Johnnie Langendorff, who chased down the murderous Baptist church shooter who killed 26 yesterday in Sutherland Springs, Texas. What an enraging, horrifying, heartbreaking scene.

Military isn’t entering convicted domestic abusers into main national gun database
It’s not an oversight, notes The Trace, it’s a quirk in how the military categorizes offenses. There’s no specific “domestic violence” charge under the UCMJ so any family abuse gets lumped under “assault.” A misdemeanor conviction for domestic violence bars you from buying a gun under federal law. A misdemeanor conviction for “assault” doesn’t.

A Legal Challenge to the European Culture of Death
Tom Mortier didn’t get a chance to change his mother’s mind or even to say goodbye. On April 19, 2012, his mother, Godelieva De Troyer, asked two friends to drive her to the Free University of Brussels. There, Wim Distelmans, Belgium’s leading euthanasia proponent and provider, gave her a lethal injection. She was 64 and in good physical health. Mortier didn’t find out until the following day. Distelmans didn’t notify him before taking his mother’s life.

War & Terror

Turkey’s Nuclear Ambitions
Russia’s ROSATOM already has nuclear cooperation deals with Iran, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, among others. Turkey is just the latest to benefit — possibly along with Iran and North Korea, both of which have been openly threatening to destroy America — from Moscow’s play for power in the Middle East and the Mediterranean.

Harvard University hosts anal sex workshop
A workshop at Harvard University on Tuesday night delved into the ins and outs of anal sex, with a presenter denouncing the “stupidity of abstinence” and the joys of “putting things in your butt,” according to a College Fix reporter who attended the event.

Rand Paul’s neighbors dismiss “property dispute” reports
In the aftermath of the assault by Rene Boucher (“the leftist next door”) on Sen. Rand Paul, Boucher’s lawyer claimed that politics played no part in the attack. I put no stock in public statements by attorneys defending their clients. However, there were also reports about landscaping dispute, and suggestions that Sen. Paul is not a good neighbor.

“Science Guy” Bill Nye Got OBLITERATED During His Recent Reddit Q&A
Celebrity in a lab coat Bill Nye might be one of the most ridiculous figures to rise to prominence in our modern era. Between his near-religious fervor for the climate change agenda, to his non-scientific takes on gender, Nye’s status as “science guy” hasn’t just been thrown into question, it’s been thrown into the bin.

BREAKING. The Judge in the Fusion GPS Case has Been Booted
In a lot of circles there has been concern expressed about the fact that Judge Tanya Chutkan is handling the case where the House Intelligence Committee is trying to pry open the bank records of Fusion GPS to determine the scope of their direct involvement in the Trump Dossier including which journalists they paid to push the Trump dossier story.

Occidental Professor Warns: Be ‘Suspicious of Males Who Strongly Identify as Men’
In an article for Public Books, Lisa Wade, a sociology professor at Occidental College (which, I’m embarrassed to say, is my alma mater) recently wrote that “we should reject the idea that men have a psychic need to distinguish themselves from women.” Why? Because “masculinity is toxic.” In fact, we should be “suspicious of males who strongly identify as men.”

Roy Moore Didn’t Deny Kissing Teenagers as 30-Year-Old in Call With Lawmaker
As a political firestorm raged over allegations that he had been romantically involved with teens, Alabama GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore appeared on Sean Hannity’s radio show Friday. Asked whether he had dated 17- or 18-year-old girls while he was in his 30s, Moore said he didn’t remember. “If I did, I’m not going to dispute these things, but I don’t remember anything like that,” he added.

‘Can My Children Be Friends With White People?’
Before the liberal revolution is over, we’ll be back to segregating the sexes — in the name of “safety” — and the races — in the name of “empowerment.” Behold this op-ed in the New York Times, one of the saddest things published since the heyday of the civil-rights movement

Economy & Taxes

SCOTUS being asked to settle the online sales tax question
We haven’t revisited the question of the Marketplace Fairness Act and the issue of collecting sales taxes for online purchases in quite a while, but with the current tax overhaul hanging on a knife edge and a new court case possibly heading for the Supreme Court it’s as good of a time as any. The reason that a federal level decision may become more and more important is that the various states are all making it up as they go along. Yet another of these disputes flared up in America’s heartland with the case of State of South Dakota v Wayfair, Inc. et al over the past couple of years.

Crisis in Venezuelan hospitals: too many patients, too few beds
The health crisis in Venezuela is approaching levels comparable to the poorest nations, with naked women forced to give birth in a waiting room, patients treated on hospital floors and forecasts that hundreds of thousands of children are at risk of dying from malnutrition.

The Migrant Crisis Upended Europe
“The migrant crisis is the 9/11 of the European Union… That day in 2001, everything changed in the US. In a minute, America discovered its vulnerability. Migrants had the same effect in Europe… The migration crisis profoundly undermines the ideas of democracy, tolerance and… the liberal principles that constitute our ideological landscape.” – Ivan Kratsev, Chairman of the Center for Liberal Strategies in Sofia and a member of the Institute of Humanities in Vienna, Le Figaro.

Starving Venezuelans are now resorting to an unexpected food source
Just from the title, I bet you thought I was going to be talking about rabbits, right? Guess again. As the people of Venezuela continue to suffer from a lack of food and medical supplies under the yoke of their dictator, Nicolas Maduro did recently suggest that people begin eating rabbits. That idea didn’t go over very well, as most people consider them pets, though some of the more desperate certainly have resorted to that measure. But this is something different.

Crisis Presents a Feminist Paradox
Sweden prides itself on being a beacon of feminism. It has the most generous parental leave in the developed world, providing for 18 months off work, 15 of which can be used by fathers as paternity leave. A quarter of the paid parental leave is indeed used by men, and this is too little according to the Swedish government, which has made it a political priority to get fathers to stay at home longer with their children.

This could be the next phase of the Catalan independence movement
Carles Puigdemont is still awaiting extradition hearings in Belgium, with several serious criminal charges awaiting him in Spain, and that could easily lead us to believe that the nascent attempt at Catalonian independence is all over but the shouting. But is it? Last night’s news brought word of more unrest in the streets and a general strike called by the independence-minded parties. This resulted in an almost total closure of the major roadways in and out of the region as well as many stores and government offices either being closed or on reduced hours.

The Science Fiction is Settled
Science Fiction is the fiction of Ideas. It’s the testing ground for the possible and the impossible. It asks questions. The most important being “What if?” And then it tries out the answers, trying to find the moral or scientific answers to questions Humanity hasn’t faced for real yet. And often these extrapolations come up with some very uncomfortable answers.

The New Yorker does Tom Cotton
The New Yorker is running a piece by Jeffrey Toobin called “Is Tom Cotton the Future of Trumpism?” Toobin is a left-wing hatchet man. Ed Whelan has called foul on him several times, including here (for his treatment of Justice Scalia) and here (for his treatment of then-Judge Gorsuch). Adam White did so here.

Can Roy Moore Still Win?
By now, I’m sure every reader is familiar with the news. The Washington Post reported Thursday that in the late 1970s and early ’80s, when Roy Moore was a lawyer in his early 30s, he pursued relationships with three teenage girls, the youngest of whom was 14 at the time. This would seem to be fatal to Moore’s hopes as the Republican candidate for Senate in next month’s special election in Alabama. So far, Judge Moore has adamantly denied the accusations, but the Post article is more convincing than Judge Moore’s denials. Is there any hope at all?

The Bolshevik Century
100 years ago today, November 7th, the Bolskeviks seized power in Russia and ushered in a century of terror, murder and economic/environmental mismanagement that killed more people than any other ideology or religion ever in the history of humanity. Not only did they kill more people in absolute terms, but the Communist regimes inspired and supported by the Soviet Union get to claim top spots in the “relative death” chart.

The Wages of Social Justice Is Death
In the aftermath of the Ferguson riots in Missouri and the Freddie Gray fiasco in Baltimore, the decriminalization of crime in the name of “social justice” — long a goal of the cultural-Marxist Left — got fully underway. The result was exactly what anyone not fully invested in Critical Theory would have expected

Moore Fumbles Defense on Appearance with Hannity
Sean Hannity was the friendliest possible interviewer that Roy Moore could have chosen to defend himself from accusations that he fondled a 14-year-old girl. Despite the host teeing up softballs for him, Moore flubbed his chance to put the controversy to rest, failing to completely deny dating teenage girls when in his 30s and claiming forgetfulness when trying to deny specific allegations.

The Prophet of Affirmative Action
In the late 1960s, Yale Law School adopted a quota system for African-American applicants. Putting aside its normal criteria for admission, Yale decided that future law school classes would be 10% black, regardless of qualifications. Other law schools and academic institutions did the same thing at around the same time.

8 Must-See Outer Space Films
What is wrong with Hollywood? Today’s movie makers seem incapable of delivering a first-class film about the worlds beyond earth. It all started with Jupiter Ascending (2015), a gorgeous, but unwatchable space opera, and it was all pretty much downhill after that. In recent months, we were assaulted with Life (2017). If there was an award for best preview followed by worst movie, this film would win it. Then, there was the disappointing and dreary sequel, Alien: Covenant (2017). It was followed by the incredibly boring Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017). Some have high hopes for Avatar 2: Return to Pandora (2018). I am not one of them.